ROCK SPRINGS — After almost three decades in the position, Young at Heart Executive Director Jeanine Cox is retiring.

On Tuesday, the Young at Heart board selected Ryan Rust to replace her.

Rust accepted the position on Friday, March 25th, at 1:30 p.m.

Several citizens contacted us to express concerns about the hiring of Rust due to what they perceived as a conflict of interest. The concerns centered around the fact that Rust is distantly related by marriage to Mary Brown, who served as the board chairperson until resigning after her distant relative was selected to be offered the position of Executive Director and before he officially accepted.

Board Member Clark Stith said that the Brown did not vote on the hiring decision, “Indeed, we asked Mary Brown to leave the room at Tuesday’s Young-at-Heart board meeting before discussing the choice among the final three candidates. Mary did participate in an earlier round of discussions to cull three resumes from the fourteen total applicants. The initial culling of applicants was done by consensus of eight other board members. After Ryan Rust was selected, Mary Brown resigned from the Young at Heart board.”

Brown’s resignation was effective as of March 23rd at 5:00 p.m.

Brown had previously announced her intention to resign from the board effective June 23 of this year. That resignation letter predated the announcement that the Young-at-Heart board would be replacing Cox, who retired after 27 years of service.

Board member Rudy Magana said that Brown resigned early to avoid coming into conflict with a new anti-nepotism policy the board passed.

Magana said that Cox wanted to start the new director off with an up-to-date policy book and that included strict checks on nepotism.

Sweetwater County Sheriff Mike Lowell, who serves on the Young-at-Heart board, said that the policy is very strict and is based on the county’s anti-nepotism policy.

The policy prevents any board member from serving if they have a relative working for the Young-at-Heart Center.

Lowell believes the hiring of Rust was done fairly and was handled correctly.

I believe it was done well.” – Mike Lowell

Young-at-Heart board member Marty Martin had also applied for the Executive Director position.

Martin was eliminated from consideration for the position during the first round of interviews and did not participate in the process so as to not give himself an unfair advantage over any other applicants.

Martin has announced his resignation from the board to pursue an opportunity with the American Association of Retired Persons Executive Council.

Martin said that the AARP interview process is time-consuming and involved a lot of travel, including to Washington D.C., “I wanted to put more time towards that opportunity.”